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X city is a 3d virtual city that I was building and animating during a 3-year period.
It was meant to grow in size and complexity as I would get faster and faster computers.
I would transfer the city to a faster computer every time I could, so in the end it would be an
almost “real” city.
Unfortunately I started wrong by choosing the wrong software (Corel Dream 3d): animation had to
be done frame by frame manually, with no keyframes. Then files were put on a render queue.
X-city was based in the city of New York. In December 1998 I animated 3d planes crashing into
buildings. One can be seen on the cover of Biblia magazine #6 – Biblia goes to America.The other can
be seen as animation in this page and was part of my videofolio “miguel soares – works 1991-2001″.
During this period I always had the same computer (a pentium 166mmx).
I started at a rendering speed of 25 frames per day (1 second).
I abandoned the project when frames were taking 13 hours to render each.
I gave the computer to a friend.

Barney Online is the record of a series of virtual performances of my character, 5Q.Barney, in the world of the internet game Quake TeamFortress.
After one year as Barney, I became first a member (by invitation), then 1st. advisor, and later, one of the 5 leaders of the largest and oldest active Quake clan in Portugal at the time: the 5Q Clan, that reached 32 members (5Q stands for 5 Quinas, as symbol of a good defense, present as well in the portuguese flag).
The global Quake community meets everyday in thousands of different locations (servers) where they chat, interact and kill each other.
Most of this comunity joins clans of 10 to 40 members. Admission into a clan is very difficult -requiring skill, morality and an understanding of each clan’s hierarchy and rules. Lastly, approval from the clan leader, founders or council is necessary. Matches between clans often include thorough preparation of attack and defense tactics. Skins (the character’s physical appearance) and maps are built by the community and sent to the servers, becoming available to everyone.
Quake TeamFortress is extremely violent, yet establishes friendships amongst its participants.

Your Mission is a Failure consists of a series of virtual performances – recorded on video – taking place inside the worlds of early 3d computer games for pc.
The performances consist of continuously dying (thus the title, taken from the computer game Command & Conquer message when the game is over), or, using hacking tricks, becoming imortal,
exploring and passing the virtual boundaries of the game architectural set, or even making music during the gameplay.
All the performances were transfered live to video using a Creative TV Coder, under Windows 95.
Games used include: MechWarrior 2, Dark Forces, Doom, Descent 2, Duke Nukem 3d.

In 1997, I made a shorter version of the video, and used a psychadelic lightbox from my 1996 solo show.
This box was placed in the middle of the projection area and would react to the video and ambient sound through light patterns.

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Your mission is a failure: Dark Forces

1. attacking a sculpture. 02′08”
2. invisible floor in the vacuum of space. 01′44”
3. jamming the door. 03′07”
4. invulnerable, jumping with the aid of land mines. 03′24”

VR Trooper 1996 A metal cylinder erects from the fresh turf. Inside the cylinder, through a red plexyglas, and under a strobbing light, one can see a rotating toy robot (VR Trooper) in a frame-by-frame kind of motion. The cylinder is meant to be an observation point for the trooper, that probably would erect from time to time, at diferent locations for routine observations. VR Trooper was made for the Greenhouse display exhibition, in 1996, that took place in a greenhouse in Lisbon, and was focused on ecological issues.